1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to sharpening lawn mower blades, more particularly to apparatus and methods for sharpening the blades of lawn mower cutting cylinders, such as upon manufacture and/or for maintenance purposes.
The term "lawn mower cutting cylinder" as used herein is to be understood as meaning a body comprising a plurality of generally coaxial, helical blades, angularly spaced about an axis, the cutting edge of each blade being radially outermost.
A lawn mower cutting cylinder is normally mounted as part of a lawn mower with its longitudinal axis (i.e. the shared longitudinal axis of the helical blades) horizontal in use, so that when the lawn mower is moved over a lawn with the cutting cylinder rotating about its axis, the blades co-operate with a fixed blade to cut off the tips of overlong blades of grass.
The quality of mowing achieved by the lawn mower depends in no small measure upon the sharpness of the blades of the cutting cylinder. If the blades are too blunt it will be impossible to mow the lawn evenly, since some blades of grass will not be cut at all, while other blades of grass will be torn rather than cut, or even uprooted entirely from the soil. An attractively mowed lawn will therefore not be achieved.